


Come Home With The Summer

by sevensilvermagpies



Series: Where the Wildflowers Grow [1]
Category: The Witcher (TV), Wiedźmin | The Witcher - All Media Types
Genre: Badass Jaskier, But also, Fluff, Found Family, Gen, Hurt/Comfort, Short n sweet, Yearning, and future jask/geralt/yen, becuase i refuse to believe he's incompetant, becuase thats the endgame folks for this series, child of surprise, flower nicknames, hints at past jaskier/geralt, jaskier finds ciri first au
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-02-20
Updated: 2020-02-20
Packaged: 2021-02-27 20:27:54
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,339
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22821784
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sevensilvermagpies/pseuds/sevensilvermagpies
Summary: Destiny isn’t sentient. It's a force of nature wrapping itself around every living thing, pulling them like a current through their lives. It follows then, that with enough belief destiny can shift - ever so slightly to the left.It goes like this.Jaskier goes to Cintra after Geralt breaks his heart.
Relationships: Cirilla Fiona Elen Riannon & Jaskier | Dandelion, Cirilla Fiona Elen Riannon & Yennefer z Vengerbergu | Yennefer of Vengerberg, Jaskier | Dandelion & Yennefer z Vengerbergu | Yennefer of Vengerberg
Series: Where the Wildflowers Grow [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1640656
Comments: 21
Kudos: 340





	Come Home With The Summer

**Author's Note:**

> This started as a quick headcannon in a chat and then spawned into this, more to come, enjoy.

Geralt breaks Yennefer's heart in two on the top of the mountain, and then turns and in his fury grinds Jaskier’s already broken heart beneath his heel. The bard is sad, then angry, and then finally resigned. He’ll get the story from the Dwarves and move on with his life, he tells himself, somewhere tucked away where his and Geralts paths will never meet again. He goes to Cintra, the last place Geralt will ever go.

He arrives on foot in record time, tired and hungry, looking like easy pickings for a group of young ragamuffins playing knucklebones in the street. After all, there’s four of them versus one of him. They don't know his dagger is just as sharp as his tongue, and twice as fast. The others are quick to run but one he catches, a slip of a thing with clothes just a sight too clean. He hooks his fingers into the back of her doublet and drags them back, squirming and huffing. Their cap gets knocked off by flailing hands, and long gold tresses spill out. At that she seems to quiet down, pouting up at him like a spoiled little lordling, ne’er mind the mud behind her ears. 

She admits they just wanted food when he questions her, so he takes her to the tavern. He’d taken Geralt’s coin purse with him, figured it would be a start on what is owed to him for years of loyalty, not that he had ever asked for payment. The witcher’s companionship had been enough for him then. But this is now. He buys them both pie, and ale to wash the taste of remembering from his mouth. She scarfs it down with all the hunger of a child, and before she’s even finished licking gravy off her fingers she’s asking him to show her how to do that with your dagger, can he teach her the song he was humming, and a million other questions. He answers all in stride with a wink and a smile, because he looks at her and sees himself.

_ When he was 15 Julian Alfred Pankratz, Viscount de Lettenhove, stole his music teacher’s lute and walked out of his parents castle, shedding both his name and his sword by the gates. There is a reason Jaskier the bard does not fight and it is not because he cannot but because he does not want to be a pawn in any game of power. Never again. _

It follows that he is not surprised when a messenger runs in frantically a few hours later, and barrells up to their table. Disappointed, perhaps, to say goodbye to his new friend. The shakey curtsey and mumbled “the queen calls for you your highness” do knock what little sense was left in him though, and he cannot stop the words from tumbling out.

“You’re our child surprise?”

And that smarts all the more, because she's not his child surprise at all, as much as Jask had assumed he’d be there when destiny brought Geralt back to claim her.

She's looking at him like he holds the key to the universe, but the servant has already dragged her halfway out the door and back to her gilded cage. She comes back to the tavern for three days, and has her head filled with stories and songs of dragons and sirens. He leaves her with more questions than answers, for all he won't stop talking, and a small, sharp blade that he teaches her to wield as best he can. Cirilla doesn’t miss how his smile turns brittle when she begs him to teach her how to sword fight properly, just like how she didn’t miss how he had called her “our child”, and maybe she didn’t know her parents but she’s pretty sure they’re supposed to come in pairs. That question burns in her mind stronger than all the others, what happened to his other half?

On the Friday there's rumours of a witcher nearby, on Saturday he rides into town, and that night chaos comes to Cintra. But Jaskier is already gone.

In another timeline she would’ve seen Geralt watching her play knucklebones in the marketplace, and something inside her would’ve screamed “that's him, that's your destiny”, but in this one she is too intent on finding where the bard has gone to care. So when her grandmother commands her, dying breath still as hard as steel, to find Geralt of Rivia, she pictures the man in the tavern who fed her and made her laugh and taught her how to cut purse strings. Ciri sets off to find a Bard.

When he hears about the news a few days later Jaskier tears back to Cintra, crawling amongst the rubble and then stumbling towards the woods. He finds the refugee camp too late, smoking stinging his eyes, burning his lungs as he cries out for her. But he cannot see her blonde hair amongst the bodies, and takes it as a blessing. The Brokilon forest doesn’t call him, and he wanders on. In every camp and war torn town he finds, he looks not for golden coin but golden hair. 

Ciri doesn't know the name of this town, only that it had been three days since she stumbled out of the woods and onto a track. There is a woman and she is smiling kindly at Ciri, touching her hair so gently. She doesn't quite trust her even as much as she craves affection, yet smiles sweetly when the woman gestures to her horses. After all, horse tethers can't be much harder to cut than purse strings. 

“Where are your parents' child? Are you alone?” 

“I lost them at Cintra, but I'm still looking.” the words feel leaden on her tongue, for all the times she answered the same question, “I'm looking for Ger-” 

Something vaguely lute-shaped is flung from the window of the tavern behind them, making them both flinch, and comes to a skidding halt at Ciri’s feet. Destiny shifts. The door opens. And Jaskier stumbles out into the arms of his child's surprise. 

The wind picks up around them as destiny sighs, finally seeing bard and child in a desperate embrace. The woman, bless her heart, knows she isn't needed here and leaves, smiling at the pair knelt in the mud. Ciri may be strong willed, determined, and oh so brave, but she is still a child, and to be cradled after such loss brings her to tears. She sobs until she can draw shaky breaths again, and Jaskier is setting her back on her feet. The smile does not quite reach his eyes but he means only to comfort her, and she tries to return it in kind. They both know they cannot stay here but neither know what else to turn. So they start to head North.

It’s a week later and they're both remembering how to smile freely again, even amongst the dust of war. Though they’ve travelled far from Cintra there’s still the danger of being recognised, not just for Ciri. Jaskier has travelled enough with Geralt that his name is just as well known, and almost as unwelcome. He becomes Dandelion, a nickname from his youth, he dubs her Cornflower with a joking tap of his bones on her shoulders, to match the bright blue of her eyes. 

They are a pair now, bound by destiny and by affection, and it shows in their lilting harmonies. She had been trained in classical music, as all higher born children are, and he could easily find her a flute in wood or silver. But he sees her, her anger and her determination, hands her a smooth baton and a drum. Teaches her how to pound upon it like a light shower and a thunderstorm, and how to rasp the ends of her words to keep their songs rooted in the earth. Their singing paves their path nothwards, though their reward is more often than not little more than kitchen scraps and a space in the stables with the horses. Times are tight for everyone. Its food at least, Jaskier reminds himself, passing the larger chunk of bread to Ciri, and he’s trying to give her all she needs; baths, a bed at night, and a new short sword. It hangs heavy on her belt, frightening and comforting in equal measures. “In case something comes after us” he says, teaching her how to parry, thrust, and disarm with a heavy heart, “but if the time ever comes, you must promise me you’ll run”

The time comes sooner rather than later, but she doesn't run. She screams bloody murder.

When Jaskier has dragged the last of destroyed bodies to a nearby river, and tipped them in, he stumbles his way over to where she is lying prone in a circle of blood. His own drips from his lips as he softly swears. Swinging their packs over his shoulders, he gathers her into his arms and stands, hiding the few stray tears that escape him in her hair. He’d known there was only so long he could keep her, though he desperately wishes it had been longer, that they had been able to sing and dance their way across the continent until she doesn’t just call him Tata because a checkpoint guard gets suspicious. But he was never supposed to be that for her, as much as he longs to be. Destiny has other plans. He doesn't like it, but he knows now where they have to go. 

_ Geralt finishes breaking her heart in two and she doesn't really remember what she shoots back, but finds herself halfway back down the track stomping towards their camp. Her fingers itch to portal straight off the top, but Yennefer knows anger would’ve wormed it’s into her spell, distorting her portal and spitting her out onto the path of destiny. She has had enough of destiny choosing things for her. Even that Witcher couldn't resist taking her future into his own hands. She grinds her hurt down into fine powder inside her, fuel for the chaos, packs up her camp, and whips herself into the wind, blowing towards Aretuza. From there, Tissaia takes her to Sodden, to war. _

Jaskier and Ciri reach Sodden Hill to find a charred and blackened land. The castle still stands throughout it all, its sandstone walls scorched grey, and a few people, small as ants high above them, scurry across the walls. The air is filled with unease. The stench of charred flesh permeates the keep, making Ciri gag as she gingerly steps over the threshold. Jaskier reaches out to pull Ciri close to him, unsure whether the battle was lost or won, but grasps at air. She was flying ahead of him, feet barely touching the ground as she ran towards the still smoking tower in the courtyard centre. 

There’s something up that tower Ciri knows, Ciri knows she needs to get up there. Ignoring Jaskier’s cries of protest, racing up the narrow causeway to the top. She runs out of breath halfway up but pushes on through the burning in her chest, something tells her she couldn't stop if she tried. She stumbles on the top step, and falls, behind her Jaskier barrels into the doorway in cloud of heaving breaths and muttered swears. They stare at the figure lying prone and whisper together

“Yennefer“

This wasn’t how it was supposed to go. This isn't the rough wood of Sodden’s tower. She moves a hand softly over rough sheets, prying her eyes open. The action takes more willpower than she would like to admit, heart thrumming fast in her chest. Something wooden clatters to her left, noise loud in the silent room. She’s not alone. Fuck. 

“Yennefer? Yen?” Wait, that sounded like…

“Ugh! You just had to come back to us didn’t you.” The bite of his words is overpowered by the relief she can hear hiding behind them, and she can’t help but smile. 

“Jaskier” she groans, as she pulls herself up to sitting, “why did it have to be you?”

That draws a chuckle from the bard, as he brings her water and food. Tells her the battle is won, thanks to her, and that reinforcements had finally arrived. Then when he has talked himself out of news, and she has eaten her fill, he falls uncharacteristically silent. Sits on the side of her bed awkwardly and wrings his hands. Dread settles over her like a thick blanket, and she barely hears herself demanding he speak his mind. Questions rattle through her mind; was it Tissaia, killed in the fighting after all, or Nilfgaard gathering forces for another attack, or even news about the witcher? He had broken the first fragile trust she’d formed in years, and for that she would never forgive him, but the bard without his witcher was a rare sight and what if-

The child that hurtles through the door and into Jaskier’s arms is a surprise. She is small and fierce, and talks a mile a minute just like Jaskier. He calls her Little Cornflower, and tells her to shush now, can’t she see that Yennefer is awake. Yenn is charmed by the child, rather strangely, something in the very back of her mind softening her face into a smile, the action unfamiliar and strange. She must still be feeling sick because she tells him that his daughter truly looks like him, the words out of her mouth before she can think. But he doesn't seem pleased by the compliment, just sad. He draws a deep breath, running a gentle hand over the child’s hair like he’s trying to remember the way that it feels under his palm. Then he tells her. And she laughs.

Of course. Of course Geralt was still in denial about destiny and of course Jaskier, him of bleeding heart, would go and find her instead. Then he tells her what Ciri can do. And she stops laughing.

**Author's Note:**

> Next: they find Geralt. Also the next part will have some good Yen&Ciri bonding plus Jaskier being insecure about his Dad-ness so stay tuned for all those things.
> 
> Jaskier’s ‘Bones’ are an actual folk instrument, two pieces of wood carved to resemble ribs (yknow like playing-the-spoons? Yeah that but an “actual instrument”). Ciri plays a Bodhrán.
> 
> Also, Geralt and Yen are given flower nicknames as well, though it sadly didn’t make it into this fic.


End file.
